


Gingerbread House

by orphan_account



Category: NU'EST
Genre: 2hyun - Freeform, Angst, Chaptered, F/F, High School AU, It’s Complicated, It’s REALLY complicated, They’ll probably fuck later, Underage Drinking, genderbent, jbaek, tons of cursing, wlw
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-03
Updated: 2020-08-03
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:49:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,262
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25682308
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Dahee tells herself that it’s less than a semester before she’ll be able to get out of the shithole called “High School.” However, Joohyun makes it hard to let go, especially when Dahee knows that she can’t have the other girl where she wants her.
Relationships: Hwang Minhyun/Kim Jonghyun | JR, Kang Dongho | Baekho/Kim Jonghyun | JR
Comments: 5
Kudos: 8





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> hey motherfuckers it’s choiv

kdh as “dahee” 

kjh as “joohyun”

ayk as “ari”

cmg as “mingi” 

hmh as “minhyun” 

  
  


It’s not that Dahee is so caught up in this new… arrangement that she can barely go a day without thinking about it. She’s never distraught about anything; _distraught_ just isn’t a word in her vocabulary. In fact, Arielle just came back to the city for winter break, and she’s better than ever.

She’s definitely not distraught, or even distracted, for the matter. She’s right here, safe and comfortable in Ari’s arms as they stare out of the window above Dahee’s desk. White snow falls gracefully from the grey sky, coating the imaginary gingerbread house that she pictures herself to be in. She wants to live in that moment forever, lying silently in the arms of the older sister she never had.

Ari’s thin arms withdraw from around her waist, and suddenly, they’re not in Dahee’s fantasy gingerbread house; they’re in the three-bedroom ninety-sixth street apartment that Dahee’s lived in her entire life. Dahee hears Ari get up and shuffle to the bathroom, before the sink turns on and the sound of water quietly splashing is heard.

It occurs to Dahee that Ari doesn’t know that the younger is awake. She sits up slouches onto her bed. She doesn’t realize she’s zoning out, until she’s thinking about _that_ again.

Dahee scowls. She’s not distraught. It’s not occupying her mind in any way. In fact, she pays it so little attention that she doesn’t even bother to think about it.

At that moment, Ari approaches from the bathroom, the spare toothbrush from Dahee’s bathroom cabinet in her mouth as she brushes away. When she sees Dahee staring into space, she says, “’Morning, cutie.”

“’Morning,” Dahee responds, before crawling out of bed to get ready as well. 

“You have a toothpaste mustache,” Ari points out, as Dahee brushes her teeth. “You look like Santa Claus.”

This makes Dahee let out a little giggle (“ _eheeheeheeee_ ”) , her eyes forming crescents and her teeth showing. It’s a real, genuine smile, the kind that’s only reserved for when Ari is around and stays dormant otherwise. It’s the kind of smile that she has when Ari pinches her cheeks and calls her the cutest thing she’s ever seen, or when she cracks a dumb dad joke or sends a derp face selfie to her over Snapchat for streaks. 

It’s not a sleepover with Ari if they don’t walk through the snow-shoveled streets of the city to go to Effy’s Kitchen for French toast and waffles. French toast isn’t French toast unless it’s made with love. When Ari reaches across the table and feeds Dahee a forkful of French toast, Dahee has to hold back her tears in telling her how much she missed her. How much she took her presence for granted when Ari was still living two blocks away from her in the city. How much has changed ever since the last time Ari came back to visit, which was a couple of months ago for a weekend where Dahee was busy with college apps. Of course, Ari stayed and helped her with them, but it just wasn’t the same.

“—so I’m probably going to be there after I graduate. Hey, hey,” Ari suddenly stops what she’s saying. “Are you even listening to me? Why are you so distracted? What’s gotten to you?”

Dahee snaps back to reality, panicking when she realizes she zoned out. “No, I’m listening. Continue. I’m listening.”

“Love, you know you can tell me anything, always, right?” Ari sets down her fork and leans forward to look into Dahee’s eyes. 

Dahee swallows thickly. “I know. I just don’t know what to make of the situation so I don’t know what to say about it.”

“Is it bad?”

“I’m not really sure if it’s good or bad,” Dahee replies. 

“Don’t think about it too much, okay?” Ari hums, taking her hand and stroking it in the way that always made Dahee calm. “This is Christmas break and I don’t want you to stress yourself out when we’re supposed to have this time together, okay?”

Dahee doesn’t know if it’s the magical and nostalgic nature of the moment inside Effy’s Kitchen, or if it’s Ari’s familiar, reassuring smile that she’s seen for her entire life, but all other thoughts escape her mind. “Okay,” she says, a smile tracing her lips.

Christmas break is like a getaway for her; a journey back to her childhood in which Ari was still in the city year-round and they would spend every free second together. Whether they were playing in Samuel Seabury playground, reading in Barnes & Noble, or at each other’s houses, they were always _one_ . Inseparable, a pair, two _halves_ of one another. 

However, when she exits the school bus a couple of days later on a cloudy school morning, her other half is missing. She pulls her jacket further around her and begs the wind to stop blowing. The cold draft only makes the separation harder.

The girl’s bathroom in the morning is usually filled with the unnatural, chemical scent of strawberry and mint. Dahee walks in as casually as she can, ignoring the thick, scented cloud that escapes from the mouth of the blonde next to her. It’s the usual touch ups that she doesn’t have time to finish at home; mascara, lipstick, even _eyeliner_. Most of these blond girls look like pandas with their three day-old eyeliner that they’ve never bothered to fix. It’s a miracle she even bothers to care about her eyeliner, since no one else does.

“—there were like three girls with the same pair of Air Force ones, so they couldn’t tell whose was whose. I swear, if someone ever tells me to take off my shoes at a party, then I’m leaving,” she hears one girl say. “Actually, I think that was the same party that Alicia went to where she hooked up with that rich Jewish guy. Like he’s _rich_ rich, and he used to go to Stuyvesant but his dad pulled him out because he didn’t want him to go to public school. Wait, oh my god, you _follow_ him? Let me see!”

Sighing, Dahee uses the temporary moment of distraction to adjust her uniform skirt (it’s not supposed to be high-waisted, but everyone wears it that way anyways) and slip out of the bathroom unnoticed. She’s felt all eyes on her ever since she walked into that stupid bathroom (juul room with toilets, whatever you want to call it). She noticed the way that the girl who was talking started talking louder, gossiping as _hard_ as she could. It was awkward, it was suffocating. She wanted to get out of there so bad.

When she walks down the hallway, people stare at her. They’re mesmerized by her small, thin but curvy figure, her small, cute face pulled into a permanent frown (or “resting bitch face” as Ari would call it). Moreover, they’re enthralled by the way she confidently strides like she just doesn’t give a fuck. She doesn’t give a fuck, but she somehow manages to get good grades, post endless pictures to her instagram, and get stoned at parties (she accidentally had too many… brownies at a party and she woke up the next day at 3 AM in a stranger’s midtown apartment but still somehow managed to get a perfect score on her calc test that morning.)

They don’t know that she has a fuck ton of issues, though. 

(It’s whatever. They don’t know. She likes the fact that they don’t know anyways. That, combined with the fact that random dudes will be in her DMs, saying “hey” and that sick sense of satisfaction when she opens the DM and never responds to it, successfully leaving them on Seen.)

She has a lot of issues, and they come and go. The newest issue that she’s had exists in her first period Research Literacy class. It’s the one that was distracting her when she and Ari were at Effy’s Kitchen.

She slides into her seat just as the late bell pulses through the loudspeaker, pulling out her notebook and writing, “Do Now” on a fresh page in a matter of seconds. Her research teacher tosses a condescending look at her that she probably thinks that Dahee won’t catch. Dahee does, of course. She just ignores it, maintaining the stoic face she always has. It’s a foolproof defense mechanism, really. No one speaks to her and therefore no one can call her out while she’s vulnerable.

She wouldn’t be able to pay attention to that stupid old man anyways (he’s not _old_ , she just likes to say he’s old because she doesn’t like him) because there’s a more occupying thing going on at the moment.

“Hwang, Kim. Do I need to separate you two?”

This is the… arrangement that has been bothering Dahee for the entire weekend.

“No sir,” Kim Joohyun says, successfully pushing her colossal boyfriend Hwang off of her. “You don’t.”

“If I see more behavior like this, I’m going to have to put you guys in a different project group. You guys have come so far in your work already, so don’t make me do this.”

“Yes, sir,” Hwang says.

Dahee pretends not to hear them as she finishes writing an extensive response to the problem “explain what type of graph you would use for this experiment.” Joohyun and her boyfriend stop messing around, but Dahee still lingers on the way that Minhyun and Joohyun smile like fools while they do their work. 

Minhyun is tall, undoubtedly handsome, and Dahee finds herself fixated on his godly features. The age of seventeen has done him well; his shoulders are broad, his jawline has sharpened, his biceps have thickened from the time he’s spent in the gym. His brown hair falls to his eyes in bangs. The way she’s attracted to him is kind of twisted. He’s in a relationship, and he’s completely unattainable, yet she’s so enraptured by the way he looks and speaks. 

Joohyun, however, is completely different.

She has jet black hair and a cute, soft face. The way she smiles captures Dahee’s attention even more. When she stands up, Dahee can see that she doesn’t wear her skirt high waisted, but somehow still manages to accentuate her small waist and curves. And her… and her… 

Dahee looks at her chest, then at Joohyun’s. She’s never experienced such boob envy in her life before, but that’s just the way it is when it comes to Kim Joohyun. Joohyun is so imperfectly perfect in every way possible, from her smooth, tan skin to her pretty, cute face to the _galaxies_ in her eyes that just swirl and swirl and swirl. 

“Okay, five minutes is up,” her teacher says. “Take a minute to share with your partners before we get started for class.”

The fourth person at their table is a skinny, pimply white kid who she still doesn’t know the name of. He smiles at the rest of them in an energetic, friendly way, peering through his glasses. “So what did you guys get for the Do Now?”

None of them respond, and Dahee feels kind of bad for lacking the enthusiasm he has. He almost flinches when he looks at her. She knows that he’s afraid of her, but she doesn’t bother to say anything about it. 

She’s rescued from this incredibly awkward situation by the sound of Joohyun’s voice, kind and soft, as she recites words penciled into her spiral composition notebook. “I got a line graph. I think he’s going to do linear regression with us today. But what did you get, Cameron?”

_Cameron. Right. That’s the kid’s name._

Minhyun is characteristically absent from the interaction. He’s unsurprisingly aloof without his girlfriend’s attention on him. Dahee remembers that day in which they somehow changed their seating arrangement (her original place was next to Joohyun); the only thing Minhyun had to do was give her a hard stare. She remembers how she (mentally) rolled her eyes at him and sat in the seat facing him.

When lunchtime rolls around, Dahee heads to the senior tables in the back, where she joins a couple of people in her little social circle.

“I forgot my lunch again,” complains Jieqiong when Dahee sits down.

Dahee knows that she didn’t actually _forget_ her lunch. She purses her lips and debates saying something about it, but Pinky is already taking out her undone math homework and plugging the problems into Wolfram Alpha by the time words form in Dahee’s head. 

“Do you want some of mine?” Dahee says, offering Pinky half of her cheese sandwich. “I’m not really hungry.”

“No, thanks though,” Jieqiong replies. “Did you do the math homework?”

As Jieqiong copies Dahee’s math homework, Dahee turns around and sees Joohyun standing at the vending machine with Minhyun. Joohyun is giggling at something Minhyun said, and in response, Minhyun pulls her in close so that their foreheads touch. It all seems so bitterly magical, as if Dahee is watching a black and white dvd recording that she shouldn’t have gotten her hands on in the first place.

“Dahee. Dahee. Dahee.”

Jieqiong is tapping her. Dahee turns and looks at her, and in response, the Chinese girl asks, “What does this say?”

_Oh right. I have chicken scratch handwriting,_ Dahee thinks. “That’s open parentheses four,” she says. “Sorry.”

When she glances back at the vending machine, Joohyun and Minhyun are gone. 

It’s not just in class and during her lunch period that she sees Joohyun. Homeroom happens fourth period every Friday for fifteen minutes, and Joohyun always sits at the front with a couple of her friends.

It’s pretty much normal for one of the girls (her name is Molly, Dahee thinks) to stand up and start being obnoxious. She sits in front of Dahee, like _right_ in front of her, so it’s a little impossible for Dahee to ignore her. Dahee sighs inwardly. This is going to be a long fifteen minutes.

Today is different, however, because the smell of alcohol lingers in the air as Molly stands up. Not a lot of people are paying attention to her; there’s a girl rushing her homework with her headphones in, a couple of gamer boys in the corner who are playing some game on their 3DS’s, a couple of people who are just on their phones, and Joohyun’s small friend group of five at the front. And then there’s Dahee herself, of course.

Molly flashes Dahee a sickly sweet smile (Dahee doesn’t know how someone could seem so benign but deranged at the same time) and points at her, almost shouting, “You! You’re kinda cool. I’m renting out an Airbnb on Saturday. Wanna come? There’s gonna be alcohol.”

Dahee purses her lips. “I don’t really drink,” she replies. “I hope you have fun though.”

Molly climbs down from her chair. “Come on. You’ll come, or I’ll make you come—wait, I have an idea. Ju!” she yips. 

Joohyun turns and faces Molly. “Yeah?” she says, shooting Molly a half-friendly smile. 

“I’m having a party on Saturday, you wanna come?”

Joohyun looks unsure. However, before she can object, Molly gurgles out, “Guess what? I already invited your boyfriend. He said he would come.”

“What? But we have a date on Saturday…” Joohyun’s face falls slowly in realization, but she doesn’t seem surprised that Minhyun bailed on their date, for some reason. 

The observation makes Dahee’s eyebrows crease slightly. 

Joohyun looks extremely conflicted. “Okay, yeah. I’ll come.”

It’s surprising, actually, because Joohyun never attended parties before she and Minhyun started dating. Anyone with eyes could see Minhyun’s influence on Joohyun, and while it wasn’t _terrible_ , it wasn’t necessarily good either. She smiled less and her kind and altruistic character seemed to wear away slightly.

When Joohyun faces away to talk to her friends again, Molly turns back around and smirks at Dahee. “Now you’ll come, won’t you?” she teases, smirking. Lowering her voice, she whispers, “Don’t worry, sweetie. We’ve all been there. You don’t actually like her boyfriend. Everyone says you do, but you don’t, do you? It’s not the boyfriend that has your little heart.”

Dahee can smell the alcohol in her breath, and the intoxicated flint in her eyes. It makes her want to spit in Molly’s face and tell her to fuck off. She doesn’t, of course, but she settles for an, “I’ll think about it.” 

_Who the fuck does this stupid white girl think she is, anyways?_

“First week back from break and these white bitches are already having a party,” mutters Dahee as she reapplies her lipstick in the bathroom mirror later that day.

“What did you just say?” a voice from inside the stall says.

Dahee’s head snaps back at the sound of the voice. The clicking of a lock can be heard, and another girl, a brunette, steps out from the shadows of the bathroom stall furthest from the door. Dahee recognizes her as Nina, Molly’s best friend. At least, it seems like she’s Molly’s best friend, since they call each other “best friend” excessively and take pictures of them hanging out together every other week.

When Nina recognizes her, her button nose and green eyes soften ever so slightly, but she sneers anyways. “Ah. Dahee, right?”

Dahee inwardly cringes at the way her Asian name sounds on the tongue of a white girl, but she nods anyways, unable to speak.

“You should watch your mouth,” Nina says.

Dahee turns back around to the mirror and continues applying her lipstick. “Sure, whatever,” she bites. “Shouldn’t you be in class?”

“I have a free period,” replies Nina.

In the mirror, she can see Nina walking closer and closer to her. “You know, you should really watch yourself,” Nina whispers. “I know more about you than you think I do.”

“What do you know, huh?” Dahee says. It’s a challenge more than it is a question. “People say that I’m in love with Minhyun Hwang. People say that he cheated on his girlfriend with me. Fuck, people say that my parents are in the _Korean mafia_. Clearly they don’t know shit, but you think you’re different for some reason.”

She says it with an outward roll of her eyes and a condescending click of her tongue. She can be mean if she wants to. It’s not hard to sneer back and spit at these white bitches in front of the bathroom mirror, because you know they’ll still suck up to you and ask you where you got your top at some party later on even though it’s a plain ass crop top that’s _obviously_ from Brandy Melville.

Suddenly, a hand grabs her jaw and forces it to turn right. She’s met with Nina’s bright green eyes and dyed pink eyelashes. 

“I’ll tell you what, Kang,” she hisses, her pretty face contorting so that a twisted smirk is on her face. “I’ll keep your secret if you can keep mine.”

“The fuck? Let go of me,” Dahee grits. 

“Listen to me first,” Nina says. “If you want Kim to break up with her boyfriend, you’re gonna have to listen to me.”

“I don’t fucking like Hwang,” Dahee says. “Stop acting like you know shit.”

“Oh, I know you don’t like Hwang. Everyone says you stare at him all the time in class, but I know you don’t do it because you like _him_.”

So Molly and Nina both know. Dahee closes her mouth. It’s pointless now.

“I’ll tell you my secret,” Nina says. “You know, Molly and I aren’t just friends.”

Dahee clenches her jaw. “What do you mean? And why are you telling me this? Can’t you let go of me?”

Nina’s acrylic nails disappear from her jaw, and Dahee feels fresh nail marks forming on her skin. “Ever heard of friends with benefits?” she says in response to Dahee’s question.

“Isn’t that cheating?” Dahee blurts out.

Nina throws back her head and laughs. “You think it’s cheating. I think it’s the closest thing to what I want to have with her.”

Dahee suddenly feels like this is all a sick joke. “Why the hell are you telling me this? I don’t even fucking know you.”

“Just trust me. Come on Saturday. Molly said Hwang would come to the party, didn’t she? He’s not. He’s not coming. She didn’t even _ask_ him,” Nina snickers.

“How do you know—”

“I know everything!” Nina replies. At the sheer shock on Dahee’s face, she starts to laugh again. “I’m kidding, for fuck’s sake. Molly told me. She told me she wanted you to come, and she told me how she was gonna get you to come. You know, she for sure can’t text Hwang and ask him why he cancelled on her. You know why?”

From her pocket, Nina pulls out an iPhone with a clear phone case. There’s a small photo card of a woman, who in the back, who Dahee recognizes to be Seulgi from Red Velvet. She then realizes that it’s Joohyun’s phone. “What the fuck?” she says, and tries to snatch it away. “Why do you have her phone?”

Nina is quicker and more nimble, and she holds the phone out of Dahee’s reach with her long arms and massive Caucasian height. “Ah ah ah!” she singsongs. “You don’t want me telling anyone that you like Kim, do you?”

Dahee seethes silently, but she relents. “You bitch,” she spits.

Nina lets out a short, mocking giggle. “Call me a bitch. Doesn’t change the fact that you’re a fucking dyke in disguise.”

At that moment, the bathroom door swings open, and a freshman walks in, her little Skechers patting against the grey bathroom door. When she realizes that the gates of both seniors are on her, she hurriedly scrambles into a stall and locks it.

Nina looks back at Dahee. “See you at the party, gay girl,” she whispers, before walking out. “There’s alcohol.”

When she leaves, Dahee realizes how terribly alone she feels without the everlasting comfort of her gingerbread house. She turns to the mirror, and nearly screams in fury at lipstick smear near the corner of her lip where Nina grabbed her.

No matter how angry she is, she still finds herself looking for the address of the Airbnb on Google Maps. The Inwood house that comes into view as she walks from the A train station is modern and she wonders how much money Molly has to blow off on a stupid party.

The fur coat is barely enough to keep her body temperature moderate in the freezing cold. When she gets inside, she sighs in relief from the blast of the heater.

She removes her fur coat and tosses it onto a couch. Adjusting her white tube top and cargo pants, she looks around to find a place to sit, but before she can do so, someone takes her hand and pulls her into the bathroom.

It’s Nina again, and this time, she holds out a cup to Dahee. “You want some?”

“I don’t drink,” Dahee says. 

“Well, you do now,” Nina says, holding the cup close to her. “Take a sip, girl. You know you want to. Trust me, you won’t get through this damn party without it.”

“Why the fuck did you make me come here, then?” Dahee snaps angrily, but Nina shushes her. “Don’t get so loud, sweetie,” she coos. “Drink up.”

Out of spite, Dahee snatches the cup out of Nina’s hand and downs the entire thing in a matter of seconds. It burns her throat, it burns so much, but when the burn finally stops, she feels something spreading inside of her. The feeling climbs higher and higher until it’s gets to her head.

“That’s my girl,” Nina whispers, and a smile appears on her face once more.

That, along with a vivid image of Joohyun sitting alone on a couch in vulnerable silence, is the only thing Dahee remembers clearly from the party. Other bits and pieces are lost to the flaws of the human brain. 

You can’t really regret something if you don’t remember it happening anyways.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so this is chapter two and i think it's safe to say imma be writing mostly lesbian fics from now on :DDDDDD

_ “Anyone else just wanna like, move off the grid into a cottage in the middle of a forest where you can bathe in a nearby stream and make your own quilts and grow your own herbs and spices and dance with the faeries? Because, same.” _

Dahee’s eyes linger on the TikTok video playing on her phone for half a second longer before she pours the hot water from the kettle into the mug on the kitchen table in front of her.

It’s already the afternoon, but she just woke up not long ago. Sitting at the kitchen table, she stares out the window and attempts to nurse her headache. It’s a relatively sunny afternoon, and the kitchen is well illuminated by the natural light streaming in front of the window. Beams bounce off of the single red flower standing in a jar in the middle of a table. The image is a stark contrast to the events of last night; dark, murky, and potentially unpleasant.

Alcohol isn’t much worse than weed (no, it’s not like that, it was only once and it was in the form of an inconspicuous brownie) and it feels like nothing new happened. She doesn’t remember much except for vague flashes of drunk people and a pair of tan thighs. But again, at parties, body parts are everywhere, and she doesn’t remember anything. It’s safe to assume that no one else remembers anything either.

As she stares out the window, she muses that she probably wouldn’t do it again.

She sits back and wonders what could have possibly happened: probably not much. Nothing really goes on at parties because you don’t remember half of it, and people from her school aren’t stupid or indecent enough to take their phones and start recording. Or, at least she hopes. 

However, the greatest mystery of the weekend is the question of how she got home.

She doesn’t know if she wants to find out. She’s pretty sure she remembers Joohyun. Joohyun sitting alone, Joohyun crying, Joohyun drinking alcohol. Excessively. More than she could possibly take.

She’s remembering a bit more from last night. But as much as she recalls, she doesn’t remember seeing Minhyun. Anywhere. Nina was right; Minhyun didn’t show up.

It’s so strange for Dahee to be caught up in some white girl scheme. It angers her that she doesn’t have control over the situation despite secretly wanting the successful outcome. Simultaneously, she mentally sits in defeat and accepts the situation anyway. It’s better to just let things be. It doesn’t matter if she doesn’t know who she is anymore. She hasn’t really known herself ever since Ari left for college.

At that moment, her mother walks out of her room nonchalantly, heading for the coffee machine on the counter,

Dahee stands up in shock. “Mom?” she cries.

“Good morning sweetie,” her mom says. The soft, quiet tone makes Dahee feel more at home than the four walls surrounding her ever have. “I got home early because they didn’t need anyone else on the trip. That means I’m here for the weekend, and we can go to Koreatown later, okay?”

Dahee blinks back tears. She can’t remember the last time she saw her mother on a weekend. The older woman was always away on some sort of business trip or at work. Dahee knew it was necessary in order to sustain both her and her younger brother, but that didn’t make up for the countless nights that she spent feeling empty and staring at the ceiling, or the days that she would get home and her mother would be perched over a bunch of paperwork on the kitchen table.

“Sweetie? Does that sound good?” Her mother asks, a worried expression invading her eyes. 

Dahee blinks. Once, twice. “Yeah, of course. Just let me go get ready first.”

Her mother seems like she knows that something is up, but she just smiles understandingly at Dahee and pours creamer into her coffee as Dahee heads into her room to change.

One soft white top and cute pair of jeans and a couple of dashes of makeup later, she emerges from her room with her curling iron in hand. Her mother is eating a croissant and reading The New Yorker, her glasses perched on her nose as her eyes scan the pages.

It’s all too reminiscent for Dahee. When she was younger, and her father was still around and they would eat breakfast before dropping Dahee off at her elementary school. Mornings would be filled with laughter and chatter. She would sit on the floor and let her mom braid her hair while her dad flipped buttermilk pancakes. The sound of her brother’s laughter would sound throughout the entire apartment.

But now, her brother’s off to boarding school upstate, her father’s gone, and it’s just her and occasionally her mother. 

It seems so natural, yet unnatural at the same time, for her to latch onto her mother’s side and head out the door with her. They take the 6 train down to 34th street. It’s so easy for Dahee to find the location of the food court; it’s the heart of Koreatown, almost like a home base. 

It’s been quite a while since the last time she came here, but nothing has changed, and she still remembers every little detail, from the wooden staircase to the dim lighting, the long tables, and the churro stand in the front. 

She runs to the table and giggles as her mother catches up with her. Tteok bokki and kimbap are a timeless and amazing pair. From the chew of the rice cake to the softness of the rice and the flavors exploding inside her mouth, her entire sensory complex takes her back.

Conversation always flows easily between her and her mother. She’s able to find comfort in her mother’s smile, the one that’s beautiful and reminds her that she herself is in fact beautiful as well. The way her mother speaks dreamily, her head in the clouds, and her hands clasped in front of her chin makes her forget everything else.

Browsing through the rows and rows of skincare products and poking the cardboard cutouts of the EXO members (who she never learned the names of) has never brought back so much nostalgia. Dahee picks up a couple of face masks and then they’re on their way to the supermarket to buy strawberry milk and hoard snacks.

When they approach the supermarket that they used to always come to when Dahee was younger, they realize that the windows are dark and that there’s a giant poster over the front door that says, “FOR RENT.”

“Oh, dear,” sighs Dahee’s mother. “I think there’s another supermarket down the block. It’s near Tous Les Jours, so we can drop by there and get some milk bread too, if you want.”

“Okay. I want some of the strawberry cream bread thingies too if that’s okay.”

“Yeah, that’s fine. Why the strawberry though? Don’t you usually buy melon?”

Dahee stops dead in her tracks. She can’t believe that her mom is remembering all of this. Tears begin to well up in her eyes.

“Dahee? Dahee!” her mom says, waving her hand in front of Dahee’s face. “What’s wrong?”

Dahee blinks the tears away rapidly, before continuing her walk. “Nothing, mom. I’m okay.”

Her mother begins to walk as well. “Are you sure, baby? Is something wrong?”

And that’s when Dahee loses it. She just bursts into tears. She starts to cry like a baby in front of a bunch of New York strangers (she doesn’t get any weird looks because it’s  _ New York _ ) as her mother stares at her in despair.

“Baby, please tell me if anything is wrong,” her mother almost pleads. It’s the most upset she’s ever seen her mother. Her mother was always calm, always composed, and always a comforting warmth for her in her childhood. Today, however, her vulnerability is beginning to show through a little.

“It’s just—” Dahee sucks in a breath. “A lot is happening.”

If Dahee would just look up a tiny bit, just a tiny bit, she would see the wave of emotions flooding her mother’s eyes, the thoughts of separation, of pride, of love, of worry, and finally, peace and acceptance.

“Baby girl,” her mother says, “You can tell me. I’ll love you, no matter what. No matter what you do, mommy will always love you.”

Dahee blurts out, “I’m gay.”

Her mother sweeps loose strands of Dahee’s hair away from her face. “Is that it?”

Dahee doesn’t know why, but it makes her let out another sob. “I don’t know!”

“Oh, baby girl,” her mother murmurs, embracing her. “Don’t cry. Don’t cry.”

Dahee sniffles. “I’m sorry.”

“Why are you sorry?”

“I don’t know. Dad always said he wanted me to marry a man and have children.”

“Well, do I look like your father to you?” 

Dahee lets out a half-laugh half-sob as her mom pulls her away to look into her eyes. “No.”

“Good. We’re gonna get you the bread first before we go to the supermarket—oh, baby girl. Why are you such a pretty crier? You’re more beautiful than I ever have been.”

“Shut up, mom.” A playful eye roll.

Tous Les Jours is meant to be a cozy looking place, but the franchise has started appearing everywhere so often that it feels like going to McDonald’s. Dahee walks in and picks up the cream strawberry bread she wants. She feels her mother’s comforting hand on her shoulder. “Do you want a drink? Tea or a latte? Go choose a drink, okay?”

So Dahee walks up to the cash register. Setting the bread down and staring at the generous display of drinks above her, she says, “Uhhh, can I have a medium honey lemon tea please?”

It’s curious as to why the girl standing there doesn’t move or speak. Dahee looks away from the menu board to say, “Um, did you hear—”

She stops speaking suddenly when her eyes land on the equally perplexed face of Kim Joohyun. 

Joohyun’s face is bare, save for a bit of concealer on her cheek that she always has on. Her hair is pulled up into a messy ponytail and she looks considerably worse for wear than Dahee does. She seems tired, extremely tired.

“Hi!” Joohyun says, her head snapping away and her fingers beginning to tap on the cash register. “It’s, um, nice to see you here. Uh, you said lemon honey, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay. Your total is 12.95.”

“‘Kay, thanks.”

They stand awkwardly in silence as Joohyun fumbles with the cash register.

“So,” Dahee says, as Joohyun fishes out bills. “Working for an allowance?”

“Not exactly,” says Joohyun, shrugging. She seems to want to brush the question off as she holds out a hand with Dahee’s change. “This is a five, two ones, and a nickel.”

Dahee takes it and turns around to find her mom already sitting at a table nearby, speaking to someone over the phone. As she walks over, she hopes that her mother would finish with her phone call soon, but her mother just motions for her to sit down and eat.

Dahee complies, but it’s extremely unlucky that the table her mother chose was close to the counter, and that the seat Dahee is currently sitting in faces Joohyun. The bakery is empty and quiet. Dahee sees Joohyun reach into her schoolbag bag and takes out a folder that she recognizes as Joohyun’s homework folder. 

At that moment, an older woman walks out of the back of the store. “Joohyun-ah!” she calls in some form of satoori, “Did you put the macarons in the oven?”

“Yes, Eomma,” Joohyun responds, as she fiddles with a pink highlighter. Her brow is knit together in some complicated pattern of stress and worry. 

“Okay, I’ll take your word for it. You have to go pay your grandmother a visit later because I made her some baeksuk. Go do your homework. I’ll work at the cash register.”

At that moment, Dahee’s mother puts down her phone and presses the end call button. “Sorry baby girl, that was just my boss calling from the hotel. She asked me how you’ve been and she wanted to know if you wanted any French designer clothing. The brands there are really nice.”

“Uh,” Dahee’s brain blanks. “I don’t think I really want anything. You can tell her I said thank you, though.”

When her mother puts her phone in her bag and motions for Dahee to stand up and leave with her, Dahee’s eyes land on Joohyun, who’s sitting at one of the tables, perched over her research reading. It’s the one that Dahee already finished Friday night. 

It suddenly hits Dahee that maybe Joohyun didn’t have time to do it then because she had work to do. Right as she gets the urge to speak up to say goodbye to the taller girl, the door closes, and she and her mother are on their way to the supermarket.

“Did you know that girl?” her mother asks.

“She’s in my research class,” Dahee replies. 

She wants to think that it’s all Joohyun is to her, but when she thinks of Joohyun’s shining black eyes, her cute smile, and the staccato of her laugh, she can’t help but feel helpless, so utterly helpless.

**Author's Note:**

> idk why it says there’s only supposed to be one chapter this is clearly very chaptered


End file.
